River of Time
by Eilyfe
Summary: As Albus Dumbledore's apprentice, Harry is used to strange tasks. Visiting the opera, buying spices in India, tinkering with the River of Time: nothing new to see there. Yet when Voldemort enters the fray, injuring Time because he has the sensitivity of a German tank in Poland, Harry finds himself confronted with an adventure that brings him to the end of his wits.
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer:** Everything belongs to J.K. Rowling

* * *

 **River of Time**

Chapter 1

* * *

Fog hung like a curse about the ancient oaks when Harry Potter left the path at the edge of the Forbidden Forest. He took to the dark, ignoring the white tendrils that crept up the thick trunks and strangled them.

The fog clung to him, too, as he broke through the tree line and took the last steps into a clearing. He smiled at the person waiting for him.

"Good to see you, Headmaster."

Albus Dumbledore raised an eyebrow. "I am not a member of the faculty anymore, Harry; you might as well call me Albus." He sat on an uprooted tree, legs crossed at the ankles, hands folded in his lap. Harry was almost jealous how the man made even that position look graceful. But Albus Dumbledore, he was sure, could walk on all fours and somehow wisdom would come pouring out of his hands and feet.

Harry waved his words away. "Hogwarts remembers her children. No matter what the Ministry says, you'll always belong to her."

Albus chuckled. "Ah, those were my words, I believe."

"Just so. There's not a stone in that castle that would forget you. Umbridge can cry herself hoarse, _Albus_ ; it will change nothing."

"Maybe Headmaster is better after all, my boy. You look as if you're tasting something extraordinarily spicy when you say my name."

"Just remembering the last time I used it. I was breathing fire the whole night."

Mirth danced in Albus' eyes. "A regrettable accident, I am sure." He rose from the trunk, robes the color of a star-speckled night sky swishing through the fog. "Well, let us not waste more of this wonderful moonlight. Do you have everything you need?"

Harry patted down his robes. "Socks, underwear, a pair of trousers—"

"I see my departure has not left you in bad spirits, my boy. I was afraid Dolores would leave you in a sour mood."

"Oh she does," Harry said as they left the clearing and took a path deeper into the forest, the shrubbery growing thicker around them. "But Fred and George got a good handle on that one. No need to involve myself. They'll send her to the crazy house before long."

Moonlight filtered through the canopy, and from afar came the clapping of hooves as the centaurs rode through the forest. The path wound past a small lake and then rose steeply and the muddy ground gave way under Harry's boots as they dug in on the way up. They stopped on a small promontory that overlooked a river down below, where the trees leaned on each other like drunken friends and the moon found its brother in the water. In the distance lay Hogwarts, a black giant at this time of night.

A flock of birds flew past, silver-feathered and silent. Wind cut at them from east, carrying the sound of chimes with it, and Harry pulled his cloak tighter. "The chime's a new addition."

"Fabulous craftsmanship, yes. Its creator was a truly gifted haggler, I admit, but ultimately I prevailed."

Albus sounded proud and Harry shrugged. _Whatever keeps you happy at that age_.

They went along a ridge and Harry looked into the crowns of the trees directly across, where an owl stared back and hooted. Then the path widened again and they stopped before the entrance to a cave, a set of delicate chimes turning.

Inside the cave it was damp, but on the ceiling glowed crystals of green and blue and, if he looked closely, also small red ones that stared at him like evil eyes from the darkness. It smelled of earth and they reached the last part of the cave shortly, down below where a large runic stone stood crooked on the floor.

"This'll hurt again, won't it?"

"I'm sorry to say but my latest fracas with the Ministry gave me little time to work on my technique. But you will manage, I am sure. Let yourself flow into the colors - they will accommodate you if you're gentle enough."

Harry shot the runic stone a glare. "You're a right bastard, aren't you?" he said, kicking at the base of the stone.

Albus' look, laden with something akin to grandfatherly disapproval, was almost worth kicking the stone again. Or litter around it. "Your appreciation for the higher arts of magic has lessened considerably, my boy. As has your vocabulary. Quite worrisome, I must say."

"I'd start appreciating the arts more if they weren't making me feel like a giant shat me out."

"If only Dolores could hear you . . ."

Albus stood before the stone and his wand danced to a tune in his mind that must've been the playing of an orchestra. He always looked as though he commanded the forces of magic like a conductor would the violins and flutes, the harps and the drums, the cymbals and the trumpets. All instruments save the horns, because horns had to be shredded to dust, nothing more. But that was another story.

Then Albus' wand pointed at him and Harry was thrown into a stream of colors, none of which wanted anything to do with him. He tried to let himself flow into them, gently, but the powers of magic lining this highway avoided him like a leper.

Just like before, as damn always, the stream of color found him to be an indigestible ingredient in the primordial soup of power it sipped every day. He screamed into the colors. His skin began to tear. There was a high-pitched whine in his ear, as if his existence insulted magic itself in some fundamental way. Then the stream spat him out and his face hit the ground with force. Next to him Albus exited the same horrible place of mixing colors, carried on soft clouds until his feet touched the grassy floor.

He knelt down beside Harry and healed the torn skin. "You must be gentle with it, my boy. The River of Time has to be handled carefully or it rejects its travelers. You're too brash with your magic. It needs . . . caressing."

"I don't think I can make love with my magic like that."

"It is all a matter of trying."

". . . it shat me out again."

Albus chortled, his bushy brows quivering. "That it did."

Harry rose to his feet, dusted himself off, and looked about. They stood before a runic stone much like the one in the cave, but overgrown with moss. The sky above them was open and alight with stars. From close by came the sound of waves, and as his eyes adjusted to the darkness, he saw the fringe of the shoreline just beyond the palm trees in his way.

"Tropical, huh?" Harry said. "You know the date?"

"I presume we will have to find that out ourselves, my boy."

"What are we looking for?"

"The Crown of Jezzabel. The ledger was sadly empty concerning more information."

"So we know nothing."

"Astute as always, Harry. Come, let us get a better understanding of this place."

They walked out to the shore and lost their boots and the water played around their feet as they went along the beach. And as the waves swept away their memory in the sand, so too would the Crown of Jezzabel wipe any trace of their visit to this time – if they found it, of course.

In truth, time was fragile as glass. But it was also just as malleable, and if you blew as good as the whores of Dalayne Street – information overheard from Mundungus – then it wouldn't care a lick if you took it for a ride. Albus, no innuendo intended, was as good a blower as they came. It took him little effort to whisk both of them through time and space, to all the places where such runic stones had been put in order to annoy the apprentices of Hogwarts' Headmasters.

Far as Harry knew, this had happened to every young man in his position since Slytherin and Gryffindor chugged too much liquor, creating the first stone and reducing half the freshly built castle to rubble. And ever since they'd done their titles as magical heavy-weights justice, every headmaster that ever taught in Hogwarts went about the world, plonking down these ridiculous stones. Some adept ones even traveling the River of Time to place them _before_ Hogwarts existed.

Harry felt a deep-seated kinship with all those faceless apprentices that came before him; those poor sods who had been made to go through just the same trouble.

Harry and Albus walked the beach until they came to a small village that in the darkness seemed like an outgrowth on the shore. It was old and on the beach lay shadowy frames of boats, like sleeping hounds of the night. No guards were posted anywhere.

"There we are," Albus said. "What now?"

Harry had come to loathe that expectant expression. It meant Albus would defer to him at all times in the coming hours. That had been different as well when they first started this gig. "It's too dark," Harry said. "We'll wait until morning and then ask around. If someone placed a stone here, there's bound to be information about that crown."

 _So that we can put it on your damn shelves, like all the other shit I had to find for your amusement._ That office, with all its mysterious artifacts, was nothing but a glorified torture rack for the headmaster to look at.

"What will we do until sunrise, then?" asked Albus. "I must say, I am partial to a round of cards."

"Sleep."

"Why, have you spotted an inn, my boy? I did not see a light anywhere, but I have often assumed that your eyesight is sharper than you let on."

With the exception of the stars – both in the sky and on Albus' robes – the world was inky black.

Harry ignored the gentle mocking and shot Albus a wolfish grin. "We won't need an inn."

Because if there was one thing all this traveling through the River of Time had accomplished over the years, it was to awaken the competitive side of Harry, who let no opportunity slip by to try and one-up Albus and the venerable wizards he had learned about in legends.

Right next to the edge of the village he waved his wand, transfiguring the sand into bricks and having those stack themselves into the shapely form of a house. Another swish, and from the jungle nearby came palm fronds that thatched the house and gathered in two corners inside as well to make comfortable beds. A tower would have been a nice touch, but on account of being humble, Harry contented himself with turning the color of the bricks into the whitewashed color of the adjacent house, adding a nice doormat with the initials _P & D_. Harry raised his wand a last time, and a group of saplings shot out of the jungle, shaped themselves evenly, then lashed themselves together into a door.

Ignoring his mentor's pink sleeping kimono, Harry fell into the makeshift bed, grinning into the pillow. _Fifth Year plus change from the time travel, and I'm as good an architect as they come. Take that, old man._

Harry expected their neighbors to be curious come morning, perhaps a tad confused and wondering if that house hadn't always belonged to the village. What he got instead, as the first beams of sunlight shone in thick golden bars through the window, was the sight of an empty bed where Albus should have been, and the corpse of a Death Eater right next to it, a pink sleeping kimono draped over its black cloak.

* * *

 **AN:** Hope you enjoyed yourself.


	2. Chapter 2

**Disclaimer:** Everything belongs to J.K. Rowling

* * *

 **River of Time**

Chapter 2

* * *

Upon seeing the black-robed corpse of a Death Eater on the floor of his hut, Harry did the only sensible thing and squeezed his eyes shut. _Vanish. Vanish, dammit!_ Lucid dreams did strange things, but there was a measure of control to them – if he wished strongly enough, perhaps . . .

The corpse groaned and Harry's eyes snapped open. Corpses were decidedly not in the habit of groaning, or making sounds at all. The real corpses at least, the kind that stayed underground once Death came a-reaping.

He sat up in the bed and trained his wand on the moving black mess on his floor. Though the presence of Riddle's lackey was disconcerting, he worried little about his mentor. Inside the River of Time, time ironically stopped; and Albus had spent decades visiting those runic stones. If you tallied up what experiences he'd made, Albus probably had about five centuries under his umbrella in which he'd done nothing but taking care of himself.

Which made Riddle, who had no access to time shenanigans, far more impressive than he deserved to be on account of his bad character.

But that was another story.

Harry kept watch of the corpse. No noise came from outside but that was owed to the charms he had placed earlier in the night. He animated his boots to put themselves on his feet while he wondered if Riddle or his followers had stumbled on a runic stone on accident. With his luck it had been Draco who'd followed him unseen from the castle.

Clad in boots, jeans and robes, Harry rose from the bed and gave the Death Eater a kick that turned him on his side.

Face drawn in pain, Lucius Malfoy stared back at him, holding his stomach as if his intestines were about to fall out.

 _Malfoy Senior, then. Well, close enough_.

But that still answered nothing. A Disarming charm later, Harry held a piece of black, polished elm wood in his hand, while the cane it belonged to rolled around on the floor. The dragon string core pulsed uncomfortably in his hand; his own wand answered the challenge with a pulse just as petulant.

"What're you doing here, Mr. Malfoy?" Harry asked, tucking Lucius' wand into the back pocket of his jeans.

Lucius honed in on him. "Potter," he croaked. He tried to move away but was far too slow. He winced every inch he progressed, and Harry even started to have something akin to pity as he watched the spectacle. With his last strength, Lucius pulled himself up onto Albus' bed and sat down, glaring at Harry through tired gray eyes.

"This is all your fault, Potter."

"I can imagine. Somehow it's always my fault when you people are the ones getting involved."

Lucius spat on the floor. "Had to play with time, didn't you? Of course you had the urge to steep yourself in a magic so ancient, so pure, that it—"

"—spits you out like chewed bubblegum, is that where you're going with this? I think I'm starting to get the picture here."

"Bubblegum? What are you talking about, Potter?"

"Muggle sweets. Or something close. It's good. You should try it, _if_ you manage to get back." The idea of leaving Lucius stranded in time _was_ enticing. But entertainment came after doing the actual work – a work ethic Albus had drilled into him by now. "You'll have to excuse me while I'll get an overview of the situation." He stunned Lucius and layered a few more imprisonment charms for good measure before leaving the hut.

Outside, the sun glared at him, and it took a moment for his eyes to adjust. And in that moment he felt his body quiver, releasing the tension he'd hidden inside the hut. Lucius-bloody-Malfoy wasn't nice company at the best of times. On a journey through the River of Time though? He could already feel the colossal headache that brew behind his eyes – a lot of black clouds, not yet a storm but close.

The only one callous enough to leave Lucius in the hut, and powerful enough to lure Albus away, was Riddle. So the big snake was definitely involved in this, too. Maybe he even slithered around somewhere in these parts.

Carried by a light wind, the smell of burnt wood wafted over to Harry. Broken from his thoughts he turned to the source, and found the village torched to the ground. The ruins still smoldered; smoke curled up toward the sky.

His eyes blew open, and for a moment he stood frozen to the spot. Then he ran toward the middle of the village and found what had once been the marketplace but was now nothing save a crater. Magic saturated the air. It clung to the ruins, soaking what remained of brick, mortar and wood in the essence of a wizarding duel gone postal.

"Someone alive?" he shouted, but the shout sounded hollow to him as it went through the village.

"Anyone?" he asked again, then ran across to a house that looked half intact, only its roof caved in, searching for survivors. But there were none. No corpses either – neither talking and walking, nor still and dead. The whole village, as far as he could see it, was devoid of life.

He searched another house, then tried to reconstruct the fight from the way the magical residue moved, forming colorful eddies of power in some places, dissipating in others. The fight had been short. Devastating, juiced up on magic, but quick. As far as he could interpret the imprints, they had blasted each other on the marketplace before leaving towards another place. And the fire they had started had spread to the rest of the village – only stopping at Harry's hut. That one was charmed with basic protections against the elements and noise, courtesy of a paranoia instilled in him by Albus, and because Harry liked his sleep uninterrupted.

But no corpses was a good thing. It meant Albus had done something to save the villagers.

That particular moment of relief lasted for as long as fury needed to wake up, shut off the alarm, and roll out of bed. Once it was winding up for its job though, Harry felt his lips pull back in a snarl. He stormed back into the hut, red sparks around the tip of his wand charging the air with as of yet unused magic.

"You goddamn piece of shit outdid yourself again. I've half a mind to levitate you into the sea and let your stunned ass drown there." For a second Harry toyed with the notion of putting that plan into action, then the sparks around his wand fizzled out—quite disgruntled at that, the last one zapping Harry himself on the way out. "Lucky for you," Harry said, massaging his stung wrist, "I'm not as mad as Riddle, so I'll have to think of something else that's appropriate. Maybe for you and a goat to, what's the term McCarthy used, _hold congress_? Yeah, that sounds about right. And it'd bloody well serve you right for torching down that place."

Lucius, still stunned, looked up from the bed on which he lay in an uncomfortable angle.

"Don't look at me like that," said Harry. "You don't need to talk and I'm in no mood to listen anyway."

Then the door to the hut slammed opened. Harry wheeled around, got off one shot that sent a person tumbling backwards into another. Maybe it hadn't been the best idea after all to soundproof the hut for his sleeping comfort. More people streamed in but hesitated to attack him. From the pitchforks, hammers and saws Harry gathered they weren't happy though. Then they spotted his wand. There was an outcry of "Skallagag!" and they surged forward, a tide of sweaty bodies and furious faces coated in dust and ash.

 _Bugger._

Harry was about to apparate away, when a brick to the head knocked him out.

* * *

When darkness receded from his mind, Harry became aware of feeling like a buoy on high sea. He opened his eyes and found himself bound to a post that two burly men in half-burnt garb carried on their shoulders. They were moving up the slope of a hill, and below, Harry saw the impenetrable green carpet of a jungle.

"Please don't drop me."

The men jerked to a stop. They said something in a language Harry didn't understand, then one shouted. At whom, Harry couldn't rightly tell on account of his limited mobility. One could say that at the moment he had a trifling problem in that regard. As well as a headache that hadn't grown any better from the furious lovemaking between a brick and his head. He was chiding himself for his slow response time back then. To his defense, however, one could say that it wasn't an everyday situation in which you found yourself beset by an angry mob with pitchforks. Such things were supposed to only exist in stories.

"Potter."

Ah. Good old Lucius. Harry stretched his neck and heaved himself into a position to see past his bound legs. Lucius hung at a similar post, moving his head and glaring at Harry. The charms on him had worn off, then. That meant they'd been carrying them for about two hours now. _Some serious dedication, that._

"How are you?" Harry called back.

"Once I get loose, I'll make sure you take the same bloody end as your mudblood—"

A fist stopped Lucius. Before Harry could thank the gentleman responsible though, someone struck him as well and he swayed on the post from the impact. He blinked. That would leave a fine shiner. Glaring at his captors, he spat on the ground. Earlier he had sympathized with the villagers, but their treatment of a semi-law-abiding citizen – the usual laws of time excluded – began to steadily sour his mood.

But at least they hadn't stripped him. And besides letting him keep his dignity, that offered other potential benefits as well. They carried him like a pig bound for slaughter, but in the back pocket of his jeans he could feel the dragon string core pulse wildly, demanding its former master and tingling uncomfortably against his ass.

Soon they had ascended to the top of the mountain, where the rest of the villagers waited on them – though it was more accurate to say they had been ascended. The top of the mountain was a barren stretch of rock, with a solitary dead tree that leaned crippled over the edge of the plateau.

To the cheering of the crowd, the carriers threw the post to the ground and Harry landed on his knees, feeling little stones dig into his skin. A man came by with a knife and cut Harry loose from the post; another pulled him into a standing position.

A deep ravine separated their side from another plateau at the other end of the mountain. On that other platform was a statue of a creature half woman, half spider. She knelt on the ground, her knees overgrown with moss and shrubbery, her hands folded as in prayer before her overly large stone-breasts.

Harry whistled and got cuffed for it.

Both sides of the mountain were connected by a bridge that lead across the ravine.

Noticing something glinting in the sunlight, Harry squinted. Was that, per chance, a crown nestled on the lady's head? It was, though he thought it a poor attempt at prettying up a woman with spider fangs and eight legs protruding from her back. The breasts had done a much better job than the cheap trinket.

Still, ample bosom or no, if ever there was a lady to avoid, it was that one.

Early on in his career as Albus' apprentice, Harry had wisely enough decided that he'd have no truck tussling in the sheets with creatures on the opposite side to humanity, or humans trying to bridge that gap for that matter.

Still, the breasts got points for nice craftsmanship. A participation trophy, if anything.

The carriers, one for each arm, pulled Harry over to a large stone basin, where an old man clothed in pelts sat cross-legged.

Lucius was dragged up next to Harry. The crowd murmured. One women came forward and talked to the old man, and there was a heated debate between them, the old man motioning at the spider-lady, the women shaking her head, continuously pointing at the ravine. Both looked equally dismayed to talk with each other.

"This is your fault, Potter."

"You said that already."

"Don't you see? These savages are going to sacrifice us!"

Panic colored Lucius' voice. He was about to say more, but both of them got cuffed by their handlers – in an exasperated fashion – as if they were rowdy first years who'd toppled one of Snape's cauldrons in class.

The debate between the woman and the old man came to a close. They were nodding now, smiling tensely at each other. The woman stepped back and the old man issued a command. The handlers pushed Harry and Lucius forward, and then onto their knees. And like crowds around the world are wont to do once they smelled a spectacle, the crowd edged closer. A tight smile on her face, the woman handed the old man a large knife.

Seeing the sharp and most of all serrated blade, Harry decided it would be for the best to initiate his escape. He jerked his head in Lucius' direction. His handlers punched him for it, but he did it again. And a third time, for good measure.

Just as Harry was about to earn himself another set of knuckles to the face, the old man raised his hand and spoke.

It sounded like a question. Harry jerked his head again in Lucius' direction, then shouted "Skallagag!" as loud he could.

The reaction didn't disappoint. A cry of outrage mixed with fear spread through the crowd. As they'd done in the hut, they surged forward, this time toward Lucius. Blinded by rage, one of his handlers let go of Harry's arm and positively leapt at Lucius, fist a-swinging.

One out of two was a good result, as far as Harry was concerned. He used the confusion and their lack of attention, and bucked against his captor, leaping to his feet and smashing the back of his head into the man's nose. It took a second attempt, then the man lost his grip on the rope and Harry ran as fast as his legs allowed.

Adrenalin pumped through his body like battery acid. He hurried over the bridge, his boots hitting the stonework with dull echoes. Behind him he heard other footsteps and angry shouts.

He looked back at the narrow path. It was, once again, time to reach for the Book of Ridiculous Things Learned Under Albus Dumbledore.

Entry number twelve: As long as there was at least a circumstantial connection between skin and wand, magic could be used if the wizard was skilled enough. Holding a wand in your hand was only necessary for the uninitiated. Albus, stretching in a small washtub and braiding his beard – pale legs dangling out at the side of the tub – was partial to commanding the ethereal currents of magic with his wand squeezed between his toes.

A layer of jeans lay between Harry and this particular wand, but to him that counted well enough as a circumstantial connection.

Arriving at the other end of the bridge, Harry fell to his hands and knees, angling his ass so that the tip of the wand in his back pocket aimed straight down the bridge.

 _Fire it up, buddy!_

His magic ignited. He felt a twinge at his ass, and then a painful bristling as magic found its way through the fabric of his jeans to the wand. From there it struggled onward through the unfamiliar core, and then belched out a gout of flame that set fire to the air between him and his captors.

Harry felt the heat in a very intimate way.

With a shout of protest he stopped the flow of magic cold, rose to his feet and unsuccessfully struggled out of the smoldering robe. He staggered over to a sharp stone and rubbed himself against it until his robe tore and he could step out of it. He'd planned for the flame to grow out of the spell halfway over the bridge, not directly at his body. _Goddamn dragon string_. _Can't you live without setting fire to each inch?_

The wand pulsed against his burnt skin in reply.

 _Keep laughing and you're kindling_.

But it had worked. His pursuers had edged back to their side of the mountain, too afraid to follow him anymore. And despite the pain, Harry grinned. Moody was only half-right when he said that leaving your wand in your pocket got you killed. This had hurt, but it had done the job.

Still bound he continued to use a sharp rock to cut the rope, trying in the meanwhile to ignore the scent of burnt hairs and the screams that came from the other end of the bridge. They sounded decidedly Malfoyian. He had half-cut his ropes at the rock, when added to the screams came another sound, a mysterious clicking that was nearby, and came ever closer each second.

The more Harry listened to it, the faster he moved his arms up and down to get rid of the bindings. He'd already become intimately acquainted with this sound once before, in his second year at Hogwarts. No need for an eight-legged repeat performance.

Just as the clicking was close by his ear, and hairy legs brushed against the nape of his neck, Harry cut through the last thread of rope. He flung himself forward and away, into a roll, something scuttling quickly after him.

Hitting the ground running, Harry took the wand from his pocket and pointed it over his shoulder, right at the giant spider chasing him across the plateau. A blast forced itself out of the wand and slammed into the spider. It sent the spider skidding over the edge of the ravine with an unnatural shriek. Then the wand grew scalding in his hand, growled, and exerted the same force, pushing against Harry with equal ferocity. _Are you kidding me_? He had a moment to blink in disbelief, then the blast threw him against the statue of Queen Spider.

Harry fell to the ground, throwing up dust. His body protesting at the rough treatment, he rolled on his back at the feet of the statue, and groaned. The sun shone mockingly bright on him.

"Curse you, Albus Dumbledore." And even in daylight, it seemed as though a star at the bright firmament lit up strongly enough to make it past the blinding sunlight.

But the show wasn't over yet, so the players couldn't go home. With his breath running ragged, Harry climbed to his feet. Then, methodically, he kept a tight leash on the wand – not the haphazard, danger-driven, and worst of all: lackadaisical hold of before – and in his most dominating manner he levitated the Crown of Jezzabel into his arms. He would make this wand listen, if it killed him.

From the other side of the bridge still sounded Lucius' cries. Harry looked at the raging mob, turned away from it, turned back to it, turned away again, and finally uttered a suffering sigh. "You better work, you rotten piece of shit," he whispered to the wand in his hand. _Why does doing the right thing always suck so much?_ "This is your master over there, so if you scatter my parts while we're on the way, he's toast as well. Remember that."

Then he apparated.

Some few people would call apparating with an unfamiliar, stubborn wand a most daring enterprise. The majority, though, would call it moronic in a very uncomfortable way, averting their eyes and wishing to dissociate themselves – and all of humanity – from such stupidity. _Fremdschämen_. Feeling ashamed for another person. As always, the Germans provided good words for beautiful concepts.

But the wand, as if it had always lain in Harry's hand, brought him safely over the ravine and close to the mob. Once he had solid ground under his feet, Harry shot a blast in the air. Then another one. A third followed, and then a fourth, and it went on until even the last villagers had understood that an angry wizard was making noise and they better run for their lives. Unashamedly, Harry enjoyed himself.

What was left, once the crowd had vacated the mountain, was the stripped form of Lucius Malfoy in soiled, knee-long underwear.

Harry stared at Malfoy the Senior and shook his head.

 _One of these days, Headmaster. One of these days . . ._

But first of all, he thought looking at the Crown of Jezzabel, he had to get answers. Journeys with Albus were predisposed to land somewhere on the spectrum between strange and insanity-inducing, but this recent one took the cake. Something was afoot, and he had the queer premonition that if he didn't take care, the last Potter would find himself sharing a ward with Neville's parents before long.

* * *

 **AN:** On it goes.


	3. Chapter 3

**Disclaimer:** Everything belongs to J.K. Rowling.

 **Thanks:** To DLP, as always.

* * *

 **River of Time**

Chapter 3

* * *

They had broken his wand. It lay before Harry in two black pieces, splintered at the edges, faint sparks still dancing around the ruins of a polished stick that had once struck fear into every gnat making it past the window in Summer.

The only thing that kept the villagers from feeling his wrath was the memory of the last time Albus and him had paid Ollivander a visit. They had been chugging ale until all three lay under the table, hollering grizzly songs that spoke of intercourse between Mermen and Centaurs against the impenetrable wood of the table's underside, which stared back at them in a judging, morally-superior fashion—each grain of wood another voice in the constant chorus that accused them of being good-for-nothing hoodlums.

Maybe that had just been him and the ale though. The voices had sounded like Aunt Petunia.

Come morning Albus' broken spare wand had lain fixed on top of the table, even while Ollivander himself remained beneath it, still as sloshed as the night before. How that worked, Harry did not know. He suspected that slave labor was involved though. Both old men had grinned like goats after being asked.

So, there still was hope. He had pocketed the pieces of his wand before cursing the frightened old man in the pelts with an annoying spell that every full moon would see him expel, in volcanic fashion, what he'd eaten the day before. Harry considered that a merciful repayment for breaking his wand and trying to sacrifice him to a giant spider.

Which brought him to this point. He sat cross-legged in the jungle, the Crown of Jezzabel in his lap and his chin in his palm as he contemplated the runic stone before him. Malfoy lay to his left, still in his underwear and silenced, for Harry had no intention of listening to that aristocratic and posh voice longer than necessary.

Sadly it became more necessary by the minute, since over the last hour he'd made no headway at all. Runic stones served as anchors in the River of Time. They led to a sphere of preserved time, an adventure resetting itself every ten years or so. Imagine a bubble resealing itself, Albus had explained it once. The process was peaceful, uneventful, and most of all free of Death Eaters. Usually.

With a sigh, Harry turned to Lucius. "I'm going to let you speak. In return I want you to tell me how you've gotten into my hut."

Lucius glared. Heavy-hearted, Harry lifted the spell.

"Potter, I—"

"—will say—" said Harry.

"—will kill—" said Lucius.

"—everything I know—" said Harry.

"—everyone you know—" said Lucius.

"—is what you wanted to say?" said Harry.

"—you understand that?" said Lucius.

They looked at one another through flinty eyes, both somewhat out of breath from speaking across each other. Then Harry smiled triumphantly.

"I can always send you back to the villagers."

"You wouldn't dare! I'm a wizard of impeccable standing! If the Ministry . . ."

"The Ministry isn't here right now, is it? Neither is Riddle, or the Headmaster for that matter. And if you don't want to be left stranded here like a dirty shoe, you should talk, and talk quickly at that."

It took Harry to levitate Lucius close to the burnt village where the men and women were sifting through the rubble before he talked. Harry was almost impressed with such tenacity, but he had also been sure that the Malfoyian core trait of self-preservation would kick in before long. Maybe it had been the malfunctioning wand in Harry's hand that had finally convinced Lucius. And levitating was perhaps too euphemistic a term to describe what Harry had done.

"We found the stone," Lucius confided grudgingly after Harry set him down some distance from the destroyed village.

"Who did?"

"We."

"Who specifically?"

Lucius sighed. "Draco."

 _I fucking knew it. The weasel was following me. Worse, I've let him follow me._

"I hate your son, you know that?" Harry said. "He's a special kind of smarmy, the one you find at the bottom of a loo."

"Is the purpose of this interrogation to insult my family?"

"Haven't arrived at your wife yet; I'll save her for later. Now, you were telling me how you found the stone. What happened then?"

Lucius squirmed on the ground, trying to break free from the charm on him. What he didn't know was that the charm was specifically designed to offer the illusion of slowly giving way under pressure. In truth, prisoners simply exhausted themselves while thinking they got somewhere. Albus was insidious like that.

"I'm waiting," Harry said.

"He'll kill me for talking."

"Not as fast as the villagers will."

Lucius groaned, struggling a last time against the charm, then he gave up and became limp like a wet noodle and glared up at Harry. "He was intrigued by the stone. Of course he was," Lucius muttered. "He said something about time, then spoke an incantation. All I remember after that is a stream of colors ripping me apart. That's all, Potter. I woke up in your filthy hut afterwards."

The thought that Riddle could likewise have found his way to Harry's bed was . . . _unsettling_. Harry had already had one rather disastrous encounter with the man while tucked into sheets, and that one had cost him both parents.

But he doubted that had been the case this time. It seemed much more likely that Lucius had received a treatment from the River of Time similarly rough to his own, which had spat him out in Harry's hut. While Riddle, much more attuned to the currents of magic, had descended as easily as Albus.

Both wizards weren't in the vicinity anymore, however. Chances were, Riddle could – much like Albus – travel between the stones without any help of random artifacts. Quite unlike Harry.

"I'll get us back to Hogwarts," Harry told Lucius. "And if you know what's good for you, you'll not touch those stones again. You said it yourself, it's ancient and dangerous time magic." He paused, then cocked his head. "And since we're clearing the air here between us, call off Draco. I can't stand him, and it takes a surprising amount of willpower not to hurt him."

"Threatening my son? Has your time with that old fool left you addled? What is wrong with you, Potter?"

Harry grinned. "Many things. But you're not my therapist, and I'd feel bad to unload on you. There's a monster in my chest and all that jazz. Wouldn't want to tease it now, would you? Unlock the cage and let it out? It's a great, hairy one."

"You're crazy."

Harry leaned in close. "Not more than any other wizard. We're all a giant ball of giggling fun that veers slightly off-course wherever it goes." Then he slapped his thigh and laughed at Lucius' face. Albus was right. Confounding people had a way of making dreary situations look brighter. The trouble, as with everything that brought great pleasure, was knowing when to jump off the wagon. Ride the crazy train too long, and you become its conductor.

"You're crazy," Lucius said again. "You'll kill us in there. Leave me here, Potter. I'll wait for . . . I'll look for another method."

"Don't be such a pansy, Mr. Malfoy. You're a grown man, goddammit. Act the part."

"Leave me be!"

To swim in the soup of time, all you had to do was activate the runic stone, then establish contact between the stone and the artifact, and state your destination. "This might get a bit rough, but you'll manage, I'm sure." _I just haven't done this alone yet_. "Ready yourself, Mr. Malfoy."

Harry activated the stone and took Lucius by his limp wrist. With the other hand he touched the Crown of Jezzabel to the runic stone. "Hogwarts." And with a noise as if a toilet – clogged for a hundred years – had suddenly been freed of waste, they were sucked into the River of Time.

And it was different than it should be.

Contrary to prior experiences, Harry floated gently in the stream of colors, as if buffeted by warm blankets. A few blue streaks played with his hair, braiding a single braid into it. Red sparks danced on his nose. He was cushioned, caressed, and loved. And if it hadn't been for the sheer unusualness of it all, he would have felt ready to let go of fifteen years of childhood trauma, plus about two additional years of Albus-trauma – which was different but just as efficient in making you unable to live in civil society.

Behind him, Lucius crashed headlong into the colors, bouncing around like an unsecured grandfather clock in a moving van tearing around a corner.

The ambrosia of time filled every of Harry's pores, washed his hair even, and a moan escaped him as the first orange tendril of energy crept along his chest. That was what he'd always imagined Fleur Delacour raking her hand across his upper body felt like since he'd first seen her back in his fourth year. If not for the fact that he saw an actual grandfather clock hurl past him and hit Lucius right in the head, he would have continued in this blissful state for all eternity.

Flying furniture in the River of Time was bad. It had no right to exist there, no matter what the furniture unions decided. Harry was very conservative in such matters. He looked at where the clock had come from, and found a tear in the stream. Black liquid oozed out of the hole and dripped into the colors, muddying them. The more he looked, the more he detected such tears in the fabric of time.

As if the River had read his mind, the colors carefully carried him over to one such tear. Riddle's magical signature coated the frazzled edges like rust on a water pipe. But at the next tear, Albus' signature did much the same.

Harry stared the colors. "Can you hear me?"

The color formed an nondescript head and nodded.

"Professor Dumbledore and Riddle duked it out inside of you?"

The color nodded again, disgruntled.

"Potter!" he heard a scream from behind, but ignored it. The colors took a moldy sock floating through a tear nearby and stuffed Lucius' mouth with it.

"Can you repair yourself?" Harry asked.

A hesitant shrug, followed by a decisive pat on Harry's shoulder.

Harry responded with a resolute "no."

More amorphous bodies and heads formed – blue, green, yellow, orange – and all of them made a show of hands that indicated he, Harry Potter, should promptly start repairing the River of Time.

"No," Harry said again.

If possible, the River of Time narrowed its eyes. Immediately after, Harry found himself next to Lucius, hurtling through colors that seemed to regard him as dirt on their metaphorical shoes. Chairs, broken swords, quills and lamps flew at him in record speed.

He was a hardy lad. He liked to think he would have endured this for quite a while in order not to get pulled into a ridiculous duty like that. But the River saw him coming from a mile away. When it was clear that Harry would remain stubborn, it elevated Lucius to Harry's former position, feeding him grapes of pure bliss and fanning his aristocratic big head with enough air to make it float off like a balloon – all while having energy take the shape of curvaceous women dancing in front of him.

Harry could hear Lucius' gloating laughter up ahead. It was what did him in, in the end.

With a sigh, Harry stopped his futile struggle. "I'll do it," he said. "I'll fix those holes."

Once he was safely back on his colorful cushion of energy, Lucius' screaming bloody murder behind him again, he asked the obvious question. "How?"

A head formed to answer Harry, but in that moment the inky black tore another hole into the stream, and the River of Time uttered a panicked, unwanted, roaring belch that threatened to shatter Harry's eardrums.

Colors trailing behind him, Harry suddenly appeared on the roof of a burning plane steering right toward a mountain range. Instinctively, he applied a sticking charm to his boots and crouched. When he looked down at the wings of the plane, two giant swastikas stared back.

 _What?_

Then the face of the mountain neared, promising a fiery death by combustion, and Harry made it his first mission to apparate away and survive. The dragon string wand pulsed with an evil chuckle in his palm. Sadly there was no Malfoy nearby to blackmail it with.

Harry squeezed his eyes shut, bracing himself for pain.

* * *

 **AN:** Hope you enjoyed yourself.


	4. Chapter 4

**Disclaimer:** Everything belongs to J.K.R.

Thanks to DLP.

* * *

 **River of Time**

Chapter 4

* * *

The world was strange. Much more Harry couldn't think of as he lay staring up at the star-specked sky and wondered about the choices in life that had brought him at this very moment to this very place.

Then he gurgled up blood, thinking in his hazy state of mind that he might die if no one came to rescue him soon. He lay in the wreckage of the plane, shattered glass all around him. Next to him a wing protruded from the earth, its swastika boldly declaring allegiance.

Apparating with Malfoy's wand had temporarily saved his life, but that was about it. The dragon string had not just brought him to this thin stretch of forest at the foot of the mountain, but had also side-along apparated the bloody plane, ramming both Harry and vehicle into the ground with relish.

At the edge of his vision, Harry saw a fox who eyed him with animal curiosity. He couldn't see the color of the pelt, but he thought it had to be a wonderful, lush orange. Addled, he reclined his head once the fox bounded away. Blood trickling from his lips, he resumed staring at the sky. What a beautiful fox. He would have liked to see him during daylight.

Harry frowned. Something was bugging him about this situation, and that nagging sensation at the back of his mind annoyed him quite a bit. Couldn't he enjoy his death in peace? Must there always be something else that ruined good occasions?

Then it clicked that he wasn't supposed to die like this. He disliked the whole idea of death—not as much as Riddle, but there you have it. If he was to die, then it should be for an adequate cause. One that either saw him boned out of his mind with a lot of liquor and women, or one that immortalized him as a heroic defender of the rights of the poor—a Martin Luther King of the wizarding world.

He belched more blood. Hanging out with Albus had made him not just delusional but also prone to fits of startling aspiration.

 _Focus on the basics, Potter._ Before he could become the Gandhi of wizardkind, he had to survive the night. Good for him that he'd always been a scrapper, getting by just in the nick of time. He was pants at all healing spells, but with some luck he wouldn't need to cast one.

Harry craned his neck and spied the wand a few feet away from him. Marshaling his last reserves, he crawled over and picked it up.

"You're a piece of shit, you know that?" he said to the wand, which heated up in his hand. "Yeah, don't strut your stuff." More blood leaked from his mouth. "I'll replace you the first chance I have. I gave you the possibility to work with me. You refused. That's on you, buddy. Only on you."

He rolled on his back. If anyone lived close by they had surely heard the plane crash and were already searching for what had made that god awful noise.

Harry didn't have much juice in the can, but he could help them out some to find him.

 _First though, I've got to make sure they don't think I'm a Nazi._

He swished the wand, the intent 'Don't let me look like a Nazi' firmly etched into his mind. True to form, Malfoy's wand gave him a clown's costume, with a bouquet for a hat and large, red shoes.

"I should've expected that . . ."

Harry felt his strength leave him, the crash taking its toll at last. Since he was getting woozier by the minute, he leveled the wand at the sky, furrowing his brow in concentration. One more. That was all he needed. A spell of some kind that would be visible enough for search teams to find him.

Flexing and contracting his magic, he pushed out a kernel of magic under great heaves, pinched it off at just the right moment, and shot it with a plop at the toilet bowl that was the cosmos. There. Done. The spell would explode above the trees, visible for miles. What did it matter if it changed color because of a rebellious wand? Nothing, that's what. He was fashion-disinclined; colors didn't matter, at all.

The fart of magic ascended past the canopy, arced, and on the downswing went off. With the noise of a heavy-duty machine gun it burst into sparks, all of which looked for their own tree to set on fire. Within a minute, roaring sheets of flame surrounded Harry, who coughed from the smoke and couldn't quite believe that he'd die like a chump after all.

* * *

He had hoped he would wake up, and all this was nothing but a bad dream. Any minute Albus would stride through the door, flamboyant as a man could be, laying out plans for another harebrained adventure. Senegal, Portugal, Madrigal—the al-places were pretty swell joints, always worth a visit. Something didn't fit in that row, but he was sure one could make it fit, somehow.

Instead, a sharp slap roused him from his delirious slumber. He opened his bleary, crusted eyes to a vision of cold beauty served with a touch of genocide. Daphne Greengrass, aged twenty, stood before him, her proud nose twitching as if she'd smelled something bad, blond hair framing captivating eyes of steel blue.

Unfamiliar were the tight black uniform, the red armband, and the hat with the metal skull.

Harry stared at her. He speculated that the River of Time was more messed up than it even knew itself, now that timelines began to mix like that. Daphne shouldn't have been twenty, in an era where Nazis were a thing at that. Though Daphne pulled off the look in a stunning fashion.

Too stunning, in fact, since she managed—without knowing it—to check several boxes on Harry's fetish register, which he had never told anyone about, not even Albus or his trusted diary.

When her lips parted to speak, he blushed a bit under his bouquet-hat and felt glad for the ugly, wide clown pants. How embarrassing; he couldn't even concentrate on what she said.

She must have noticed something in his gaze, though, because next thing he knew, the chair he was bound to toppled backwards and he crashed hard onto the floor, staring up at the fluorescent lighting of the cell chamber he was in.

"Are you a spy from the Underground?" she asked, looking down on him from above.

 _Focus, Potter. Focus!_

"The other angle was better," he said, fixing, with all the might several years as Lé Survivant granted him, his attention on her eyes, not her long legs or the swell of her ample chest. "More conducive to discussion."

"What are you talking about?"

"I can't concentrate like this," he said. "It's overloading my brain. You're overloading my brain."

"Tell me what you know about the Underground, soon at that, or I'll find more creative ways to make you talk."

 _Yes, please do. Mhh, find those ways_.

"I'm telling you," Harry said instead, "I can't focus if you're standing like that in front of me. Makes it really hard to look in your eyes, you get me?"

Daphne looked at him for a short while, then snapped her fingers in a dismissive gesture that sent an unnatural shiver through Harry that was entirely sexual in nature.

Two beefy hands grabbed him and pushed both him and the chair back into their former position. In a remote part of his mind he lamented that he hadn't tried to disguise himself as a Nazi—though with Malfoy's wand, who knew how that would've ended.

"Now talk," she said. "And talk fast."

"Well, what do you want to know?"

"Let's start with 'who are you?'"

"Name's Harry," he answered her truthfully. He hadn't yet seen if they had wands anywhere, but his pain had lessened considerably. "As you can see, I'm in a somewhat singular profession. Not many clowns around these days. People start getting scared by them. A bunch of bad apples, is what I say to that. Not the whole barrel though, oh no. But that's what you get with all the fearmongering on TV that makes us out to be cruel, heartless, marauding killing machines. I swear, lately you see more clowns with chainsaws than with flowers squirting water. It's ridiculous, absolutely bonkers! The union had a meeting about that lately, was about to split in half. Because that's the thing, you see? Those clowns with chainsaws? They're clowns, too, and they work just the same as us regular folk. But we normal clowns have gotten less and less contracts while they prosper—it's not fair, even if it's got a vibe of survival of the fittest to it. It's a bloody usurpation, that's what it is. And I—"

"Stop your jabbering."

"But the clowns—"

"I said stop—your—jabbering.

"You should listen to her, pal," came an upbeat voice from behind. The man who had helped him up sounded familiar, even if Harry couldn't quite place from where. Seeing the guy would help a lot with that.

"Are you an Underground spy?" Daphne asked, leaning closer, spreading the alluring aroma of motor oil and polished steel. "Are you," she continued, more threatening, "one of _her_ men?"

Harry assumed that she meant someone high in the Order's ranking. If Daphne was a Nazi, that was exactly the kind of game fate would play with him. Muddle the timelines, age and de-age people, shuffle them like dice in a cup. His head hurt already. But he was Harry Potter and would persevere, as always. He'd repair the shit out of the River of Time, get Albus—wherever he currently was—stomp Riddle, and then retire somewhere nice, with tropical weather, beaches, and naked women.

So, someone high in the Order. Female. Minerva? That might fit the bill.

"How could I be one of _her_ men? I'm a goddamn clown. Can't you people see that?"

"And you expect us to believe that?"

"I'd be the worst spy in history with that outfit."

"You talk a good clown game though, pal," the unknown man commented.

Daphne slammed her flat palm on the metal table in front of him and leaned in even closer, blond tresses rolling richly over her shoulders. "I will ask a last time, _Harry_. Who are you? If you don't tell me now," she said in a low, threatening whisper, "I _will_ make sure you regret it."

Harry closed his eyes, thinking ugly thoughts to keep the heavy machinery in his pants under control. He counted down to three in his mind, then focused on the task at hand.

"I'll tell you," he said. "No need to get your knickers twisted." _Oh yes, please, get your them twisted._ "Can I have your name first though? That's only good manners."

She narrowed her eyes at him, then nodded sharply. "Leutnant Daphne Greengrass," she said. "Now, start talking."

He was surprised how quickly she had acquiesced, but with that final confirmation that it was indeed her and not a good homunculus Harry told his tale, true to his word.

"I'm, well, you could call me a repairman. Forced, but there you have it. I got suckered into a time travel adventure by my headmaster, and now I've got to fix the River of Time so things can return back to normal. That I landed on your porch was purely an accident. I had no plans boarding that plane, I swear. The Third Reich is safe from me."

She looked at him, then he met her knuckles and was sent to the floor a second time that meeting. She put the heel of her right boot on his groin and started grinding cruelly, and Harry winced in pleasurable pain.

When she noticed that he was gaining satisfaction from this, she stopped abruptly and kicked him right in the gonads.

"Take him back to his cell," she said gruffly while Harry writhed around on the floor. "I'll report his unwillingness and request additional resources to make him talk."

"That's cruel," the man's upbeat voice answered. "But I guess he deserves it for that incredible lie."

"Careful, you sound like you admire him," Daphne said.

Harry could practically feel the man shrugging behind him. "For coming up with such a ridiculous thing on the spot . . . I have to say that's worthy of some admiration."

"Urgh. Just get him to his cell."

Then Leutnant Daphne Greengrass was gone, her boots thumping across some hallway or another, soon receding to nothingness.

Strong arms pulled Harry up, cut him from the chair, and put on simple but old manacles with a stretch of chain between them. "There you go, pal. I mean what I said. That was great. Well done."

Harry turned around; and the first glimpse of this nice Nazi nearly knocked him unconscious.

"What's your name, mate?" he asked with a weak smile, feeling his legs shake.

"Unteroffizier Neville Longbottom."

"I knew it . . ." Harry mumbled as they stepped out into the hallway, and he was marched to another cell.

"What? I didn't get that," Neville said with a cheery grin. "You've got to speak up, pal."

Harry looked at Neville Longbottom, aged around twenty, patches of brown fuzz growing unevenly on his face. He, too, wore a black uniform and a red armband. What was the world coming to?

"I said that your Leutnant's hot as nothing I've ever seen."

Neville blushed beet red but nodded fiercely, throwing furtive glances about him to see if someone was nearby. "She is, isn't she?" he whispered in a conspiratorial fashion.

"Won't you let me go?" Harry asked.

Neville shook his head. "No can do, sorry about that. You seem an okay sort, but until we know what's up with you, I'll keep you locked in." They halted in front of an open cell. "Between us, you should really talk. You don't want her to bring in extra requisition. Those items are bloody dangerous—they're unpredictable. I've seen quite a lot of people die that way."

"And you really won't let me go?"

Neville sighed. "Don't keep asking, pal. You're making it hard on both of us." His skull belt buckle gleamed in the aggressive, shrill light.

"Them's the rules, huh?"

"Them's the rules," Neville said.

"I'm sorry."

"What—"

Harry threw himself against Neville, slamming him into the wall, putting his manacles around his head, and using the chain link between them to garrote Neville. He would only choke him a bit, until he was unconscious. That was the plan. Harry Potter Bond in action, full force against the Nazis.

Or, well, that had been the plan.

The moment Harry tried to slip the manacles over Neville, Neville had smashed his forehead into Harry's nose. It made an ugly cracking sound, and then Harry was hurled against the wall and slumped down.

Holding his bloody nose, Harry looked up. Unteroffizier Longbottom stared down at him, cracking his knuckles—a dark, aged, brawling-proficient specter of the Neville he once knew. "You really shouldn't have done that, pal. That's not good manners. And if there's one thing the Führer wants, it's good manners."

* * *

Harry awoke in the dim light of his cell once Daphne's voice roused him from a fitful sleep. She looked still as delectable as before, but he couldn't concentrate on that as much, since his face hurt and escaping now took precedent.

Behind her, Neville pushed a trolley into the cell. On it stood an apparatus reminiscent of an old movie projector, with sickly glowing, bulbous crystals attached to the side. Arcs of lightning jumped between the crystals, scattering here, now zapping there, sending an ominous buzz through the cell. A narrow piece of wood stuck to one side, a few feathers bound to it with string.

"Careful," Daphne said to Neville, "it's delicate."

"You don't have to tell me. It's my name on that requisition form, not yours."

"You're too cheeky for a subordinate," Daphne said coldly.

Neville, who crouched next to the trolley and fiddled with the apparatus, grinned up at her; and in that strangely roguish grin Harry detected another difference between this Neville and his own. This one got tail.

"Can you check if it's aligned correctly?" Neville said, head behind the apparatus.

"It is," Daphne said, though she didn't look as assured as she sounded.

They hadn't yet noticed that he was awake again, so Harry took the chance to inspect the strange machine they had carted into his cell. It was ugly—a ramshackle job of some underpaid engineer—yet the lightning between the crystals bespoke some serious juju underlying the whole construction. The wooden part was pointing at Harry, and as he squinted at the feathers bound to it, a terrible idea settled in his mind.

"Are you trying to use magic with that thing?" he asked, one part morbidly curious, two parts horrified.

Daphne wheeled around to him, her lips pulling back in a sharp grin. "So you recognize what this is," she said triumphantly. "No clown would know it from a film projector!" She turned to Neville, her chin raised in victory. "That confirms it. He is an Underground spy."

Neville shrugged. "Not a good one, then. He's rather bad at fighting."

"Bite me," Harry said. "And I've still no idea what you're talking about. I told you the truth."

"Your lies don't matter anymore," Daphne said, patting the projector. "This magi-tech will make sure you tell us all you know."

"Are you sure that thing can work magic? It looks like a first grader put it together."

Daphne's eyes widened in indignation. "You dare insult the achievements of the German magi-tech division? The greatest there ever was?"

Neville shook his head ruefully behind her. "Not a good move, pal. She's into their head engineer. Shouldn't insult anything Malfoy does, or it's your head on the platter."

That made the apparatus shine in a new light. So a Malfoy had a hand in this abominable contamination of taste? He should have known. But why were they in need of such technology in the first place? Had something happened to magic as such, or to the way it could be used?

Important questions, but the arguably more egregious information made him stare at Daphne in horrid fascination. It didn't matter much whether Malfoy the Senior or Malfoy the Junior, to be enamored with either—especially if you were a bombshell like Daphne—spoke of a dire need for counseling. With that outfit she could have anyone. Why a Malfoy? This world was just insane.

Daphne procured a slip of paper and handed it to Neville.

"Here is the spell," she said. "Recite it clearly first, so you don't bungle it."

Neville took the piece of paper and studied it before enunciating the spell carefully. " _Veritas et Crucio_."

Harry's eyes blew open. The first part was bad enough, but a Crucio of all things—and in such an abomination of mangled latin too? Best case it'd be a normal Crucio. Worst case, it couldn't be stopped or some other unpredictable failure happened.

"You know," Harry said, "I think we should talk about this."

In the face of that projector, he was truly willing to tell them as many stories about the Underground as he could invent on the spot.

"There is nothing more to talk about with you in this condition," Daphne said with a twinkle in her eyes. "You'll tell us anything we want soon enough. Neville, you can start."

Neville nodded.

"Sorry, pal. Nothing personal, but the Reich has to move on and all that stuff."

"Don't add 'all that stuff' to it," Daphne said.

Neville rolled his eyes, then cleared his throat, staring with concentration at the paper in his right hand, his left palm flat on the back of the projector.

" _Veritas_ —"

The crystal changed from blue to red; angry lightning jumped towards the feathers and the wood.

"— _et_ —"

Harry felt the air charge with the unmistakable signs of a Dark Curse gathering steam to be unleashed in destruction. _Oh shit, is this really happening?_ He began squirming against the manacles binding him to the chair.

"— _Cru_ —"

Mid-syllable for that last, devastating part of the incantation, a fox hurtled through the open cell door, leapt, and sunk his teeth in Neville's arm. With a startled cry, Neville pulled his hand away from the projector.

Then the wall exploded inward, blasting Neville, Daphne, and the magi-tech contraption away and against the other end of the cell. In the rubble, dust rising in agitated eddies around his feet, stood an old, stooping man in robes, holding a real wand.

"The Underground," Daphne gasped, coughing from the smoke. Sirens howled in the background. Boots thudded on the floor.

With a contemptuous flick, the wizard destroyed the apparatus, then grabbed Harry, the fox jumping on his shoulder, and apparated all of them away.

* * *

In the confusion, Harry hadn't gotten a good image of the wizard, had only seen his old and stooped form. Now—after a rapid apparation—he found himself in the cushy confines of a floral chintz armchair; and there he saw that the old and stooped wizard was in fact a rotund, red-cheeked Ollivander, with many hairs bristling out of his ears, who sat contentedly in another armchair across a small coffee table.

Harry checked his arms. They weren't bound. That was a good sign.

He was in a vulnerable position nevertheless. His wand was gone, and Nazi's were abound. That made blending in necessary, and to do that he first needed information about this world.

Because whatever tango Albus and Riddle had taken it upon themselves to perform inside the River of Time, it had screwed up time and all its intersections majorly. That much he could tell. How to repair that mess, now that he'd have to decide once he knew more.

"Are you done?" Ollivander asked.

Harry was about to address him, when a clinking of cups came from behind him. Ron Weasley entered into the cozy chamber, holding a tray with teacups, scones, and a large, steaming pot that spread the smell of peppermint.

"Coming, boss, don't you get your knickers in a twist."

Ron set down the tray, putting a cup before Ollivander and Harry each. "Good that you're awake, mate," he said to Harry as he placed the scones on the table. "Was mighty close with those guys, I'd say. Not good company for a nice evening, no sir."

Harry squinted at him. This Ron was tall, lanky, had the same hair color and freckles, and seemed a nice sort. The hair color shifted some pieces in Harry's mind, completing the picture.

"You're an Animagus," Harry said. "The fox."

"That's me," Ron said with a grin. "Good thing we came when we did. That looked ugly, it did, what they were doing in there with you."

 _I thought your fur would be a nice, lush color. Does that mean I wanted to see your pubic hair when I was dying? Was this my natural sexual deviancy breaking through the bonds of repression as I was so close to death?_

Such were the questions running through Harry's mind as he congratulated Ron ebulliently on his achievement of becoming an Animagus.

Then he concentrated on Ollivander. The man had saved him—with a wand. He also looked different from his counterpart of the baseline reality that Harry knew. More roundish, at peace with himself and satisfied. Which was quite a personal victory for someone living in a time harboring Nazis.

"You saved me," Harry said.

"I did."

"Can you tell me who you are?" Harry ventured carefully, trying to wheedle out some information and blend in.

"I'm Ollivander," Ollivander said. "Surprised? I thought so. But of course no one would believe you, were you to tell the outside world this secret."

"Because you belong to the Underground?"

Ollivander goggled at him. "You mean to tell me you don't know my name? Know not what I stand for? Where have you been, boy?"

" _Are_ you from the Underground?" Harry asked.

Ron snorted; he was busy behind them washing dishes. "In a manner of speaking," he said, making squeaking noises as he toweled a plate.

Ollivander ignored Ron. To Harry he said, "Are you pulling a prank on me, lad? Do you really not know who I am?"

"Say yes, mate, it'll be easier for all of us," Ron said, setting down cleaned dishes.

"Hush now, Weasley," Ollivander said with an annoyed glance at Ron. "I'm not talking to you."

"I have problems with my memories sometimes," Harry said. "Old magical family issue; I seem to remember something about wands? But that's about it, really."

"Blimey!" Ollivander leaned back in his armchair, aghast. "Well, that won't do. At all. I'm considered dead, but not that dead.

"And there we go," Ron murmured. "Good job. Why's no one ever listening to me . . ."

"I," Ollivander began in an almost regal and punctilious manner, "am Ollivander, head of the Wandmakers, the First of the Underground, the Sapper of Magic. I have quite a few more titles, but those cover it pretty well."

"Sapper of Magic?" Harry asked. "That something to do with why they carted that abomination into the cell? Why they weren't using wands?"

"My lord! Where have you been?"

"Severely uneducated, sir," Harry answered, taking a scone. "I learned through accidents and diaries about this strange wizarding world. It's all quite new. I'm a clown by trade, you know."

"Didn't you say your family had magical memory issues?" Ron asked suspiciously.

Harry stared at Ron, the cogs working in his mind. "That's why they wrote the diaries. Terrible memory, really. It's a curse. And I mean that."

"I believe you," Ollivander said, glaring at Ron. "And you should go and make yourself useful around the house, Weasley. You're being rude to our guest."

"Being useful around the house is about all I do," Ron said, stalking outside, eliciting a protest from Ollivander as he chucked the dish towel into a corner.

"Such an uncouth lout," Ollivander said, shaking his head. "But to your question—yes, the title Sapper of Magic is intimately related to this 'abomination' you encountered. An apt term; good job, lad. You see, it was I and the Wandmakers who made wands unusable. For obvious reasons."

Remembering that Nazis were not good people, Harry stabbed in the dark with a guess. "Because of the war."

"Just so," Ollivander said, nodding gravely. "The first war was horrible; a true massacre. But the second? Lad, it's been going on for close to fifty years now, and most people have forgotten what started it, even what its major principles where. These young men and women with that infernal red armband nowadays, like the ones you met? They have about as much in common with the original crusade of extermination as I have with hardcore bondage."

Harry stared at Ollivander above the rim of his teacup. What do you say to a comparison like that? He was glad though that Neville and Daphne weren't putting people in ovens. That would have muddled his memories a lot; and appreciating Daphne in her uniform would've become much harder.

That the second world war was still going on and had lasted for fifty years though, now that was different from the history he remembered.

Harry cleared his throat. "I seem to recall from a diary entry of my uncle, correct me if I have the names wrong, that Dumblecore, and Grindelmalt were involved in the war?"

"You mean Dumbledore and Grindlewald? Those names are positively ancient, lad." Ollivander shook his head wistfully. "They died during the first war. Promising lads, but they bit off more than they could chew when they summoned a greater demon. No, far more interesting is their student," Ollivander imparted with a teasing smile, as if he knew exactly that Harry was just salivating for this information.

He was not wrong about that.

"Their common student?" Harry asked.

"Just so, lad. Birds of one feather, both of them. Very pink feathers. They shared everything, from beds to underwear to students. The last one got them in trouble once I think, when the sharing went a bit too far. Consenting adults, all parties, but it was really in poor taste."

Harry decided to purge the resulting image the moment he had a chance to. "So," he asked, "who was their student?"

"A dangerous legacy. Very dangerous. You really know nothing, huh?"

The thought seemed to excite Ollivander. Harry slowly got a feel for the man. He seemed to belong to the kind of old person who liked to talk, endlessly, cheerily, and with vast attention to detail. The kind everyone knew at least one version of, and tried to circumvent meeting that person forever.

"I'm sorry," Harry said, coyness personified, "but as I said, a very poor education."

 _Sorry, Albus._

Ollivander rubbed his hands. "That's just fine, don't you worry. Their legacy," he went on, "was no one else than Minerva McGonagall."

"McGonagall?"

"That's what I said."

"And she is dangerous?"

"Was, lad. Was. She died a decade ago. Now a flunky of her runs the show. Surly guy."

"Why? I mean why would Mcgonagall . . ."

"Boggles the mind, doesn't it? First Führer Minerva McGonagall was—"

"Did you just say 'First Führer'?"

Ollivander nodded. "Indeed. She whipped the German wizardry into a horrible frenzy."

Harry massaged his forehead. There was something inherently wrong with this picture. With a curiosity that sickened him somewhat, Harry thought about this matter. As horrible as it sounded, how Professor McGonagall had become a Nazi was too good a story to pass up on.

"It was an incurable hate toward the Goblins and their kind," Ollivander explained. "Money problems, you know. Many a McGonagall had lost their home to violence and poverty during the first war. Their debts with Gringotts were high."

Harry sucked in air. If there was one thing you never wanted to do, it was having outstanding debts with the Goblins for too long.

"I can see you get me," Ollivander said. "Now, of course Goblins are like any other creature you'll find. There's good and bad ones; those you do a favor, and those you want to smack with a brick and stuff their stinking, bleeding heads into the loo."

"Right."

"The thing is, Goblins have a penchant for hording gold. Which is quite the opposite of us humans—we like to spend it. In the same vein, they don't like to bugger; while we like to bugger. But you see how such differences could become easy fodder for inciting racial tensions."

Harry nodded. "But why would Minerva—that woman do that?"

"It was a Goblin unaffiliated with the bank," Ollivander said. "In such financially dire times, he reached out to each McGonagall in private. He had a terrific plan. I could draw it for you if I had a piece of paper, but it was basically a pyramid. All you had to do was find more people to fill it. Everyone would profit."

"Everyone?" Harry asked dubiously.

He remembered Vernon getting entangled in something quite similar once. Luckily Petunia had had more fiscal sense than her husband—even if that sense temporarily malfunctioned every 365 days whenever Dudley had plagued the world for one year and promised a repeat performance for the next.

"Everyone but Minerva; she was fighting in the war," Ollivander said. "The Goblin was quite smart, explaining the deal to them; and in every McGonagall he fanned the desire to keep it a secret—wouldn't it be a nice surprise if suddenly you could be the earner your family dependent on? The scheme was for free, by the way. All the Goblin wanted was a small commission if the McGonagall in question wanted him to establish contact with another person whom he could rope into the scheme. Just a scant few Galleons, of course."

Harry heard Ron come down the stairs somewhere, his feet thudding on the wood.

"So the McGonagalls took it?"

"They did, all of them. That's the thing, it felt like a foolproof plan for people who were desperate. In secret, each on their own, they went to Gringotts, increased their debt, paid the Goblin his small fee for connecting them to hurry the process, and then waited."

"The Goblin robbed them, didn't he?"

"Well," Ollivander said, "robbing is a strong word. He did provide them with the connections he had promised."

"So it worked?"

Ollivander shrugged. "Every McGonagall got a letter with a time and place where he could meet more people to convince. So they went there, and ultimately found each other."

"That's just insidious," Harry said, indignation rising in him.

"You don't know the half of it. Since they had each paid the Goblin a small sum, they couldn't repay their debt in full. That drove them to ruin. Information gets a bit murky, but I know one killed himself with an Avada through the ear."

"And when Minerva came from the continent, she blamed everything on the Goblins," Harry said, connecting the dots.

"Just so, lad. Just so. War had made her a hard woman. Her blame soon turned to hate, then to wrath, and ultimately to something far more terrible that later defied description."

"Did she . . . ?"

"She created a fierce machinery of war, and for decades there was nothing but. Until I and the Wandmakers decided that enough was enough." Ollivander slapped his armrest with emotion. "We banded together to take wands from the table with the help of arcane magic. That was as much as we could do at the time."

Harry nodded, impressed despite himself. "That's actually quite amazing."

Ollivander preened under the compliment, but to Harry that seemed almost adorable, a peculiarity of old age. He didn't hold it against the man. Here was a hero; a veteran.

With lumbering steps, Ron came walking into the room again, just as Ollivander ended his story with words that held real gravitas.

"Her family's story, lad, is a tragic one; one that happened all over the world as war engulfed everything. It is really quite sad."

Ron snorted, but was otherwise quiet.

"What was his name?" Harry said.

"Whose?"

"The Goblin's," Harry said.

"Salazar. His name was Salazar. Strange as far as Goblin names go, but there are worse. You know, there existed a Goblin warlord called Hufflepuff a few centuries back—but he supposedly never amounted to much even though his was the largest kingdom. How that works, I don't know. Goblin lore is a tricky beast."

"You should ask him how he knows all that stuff about Salazar and the McGonagalls, mate," Ron said, leaning against the wall. "That's a pretty detailed story, isn't it?"

Harry stared at Ron, then slowly swiveled is gaze over to Ollivander, who regarded Ron with a basilisk-like glare that still managed to invoke a sense of petulance on his hoary face.

"How do you know all this?" Harry asked, chiding himself for forgetting the essential questions while Ollivander had lulled him into the story.

Ollivander reached for his teacup. "That's a story for another time, lad. My throat's quite parched. I'm not quite as agile as you young'uns."

"He was the one who invented that scheme," Ron offered helpfully. "Drunk out of his mind and gambling with the Goblins. Gave it first to Salazar, then snuck it into the Muggle world, where it's still making the rounds to this day."

"Must you always prattle, boy?" Ollivander asked. "Can't you for once keep your trap shut?"

Ron shrugged. "Just keeping you from getting a big head."

Harry glowered at Ollivander. "So you partly started that war . . . and then contained it?"

"A reasonable thing I should say," Ollivander said defensively. "I made a tiny mistake, and then I cleaned up after myself. That's simply how adults deal with problems, lad. Better get used to it."

"The way he got all wand makers around the world to join his Wandmakers party is another story altogether," Ron added ponderously. "And not a nice one either. But that'd be too long for now." Looking at Ollivander, he said, "What are we going to do with him?"

Ollivander shrugged. "Take your pick, lad. Where in London do you want to wake up?"

"Wake up?"

"Wake up," Ollivander confirmed.

"You like the Leaky Cauldron?" Ron asked.

"It's alright," Harry said suspiciously. He had an inkling what would happen, but without a wand he was at a severe disadvantage.

"That's good enough," Ron said. "And please, don't try to apparate into this room from memory alone; it would splatter you across the wall, and I'm the one who've got to clean it up afterwards."

"I won't," Harry promised. "Can I say something?"

"Please."

"I get that you need to get me unconscious so you can deposit me in peace far outside your wards—no problem there," Harry said. "I understand the need for safety, really, I do. But can you do me a favor?"

Ron shrugged. "Depends on the favor."

"Can you transfigure my clothes into something appropriate? And can you make sure it's not painful? I've had quite a few days; I'd appreciate a smooth transition to unconsciousness for once. That'd be swell."

"We can do that," Ron said. "No trouble."

"Thank you," Harry said with a sigh.

Then Ollivander rose from his armchair in a fluid motion, wand a-waving, and Harry's world turned black.

* * *

Harry woke in a room in the Leaky Cauldron. Ron sat at the edge of his bed, stoppering a bottle of smelling salt. From outside came the industrious noise of a magical alley. Someone advertised cauldrons; another voice decried the poor quality of herbs sold in Declan's Apothecary.

It almost felt like coming home.

"Thanks," Harry said, reaching out and shaking Ron's hand. "You've no idea how good it feels to find helpful people for once."

"Believe me, I can imagine," Ron said. "Don't worry about what you heard from Olli. He's an attention whore and a crank, but he's got his heart at the right place."

"Even if he gave cause to start a war?"

Ron shrugged. "Even then. He's not a prophet. What he did was bonkers, but how was he to know what would happen? In his own way he tries to make up for it."

"That's . . . comforting?"

Ron grinned. "I'll leave you to it, mate. Get yourself sorted, and have a professional take a look at that memory curse. Sounds ugly."

"I'll do that."

"Ah, before I forget it . . ."

"Mhh?"

"Don't become one of them, please," Ron said.

"A Nazi? Why would I?"

"They've got good recruitment," Ron admitted. "Makes it easy to get by if you're on their side."

Harry considered that. How absurd. "I'm pretty sure that won't happen to me."

"Good," Ron said with a smile. "I've had a few friends who did that, you know—"

"I'm sorry."

"—and I really hated blasting them to bits for it. You seem alright. I wouldn't want to make you a stain at the wall."

"Okay," Harry ventured. "I'll make sure to remember." _That's what over fifty years of war gets you_ , he thought as he showed Ron to the door of the room, _they're all bloody mental_.

Once Ron had left the corridor, Harry looked about. On a window sill lay an already read but unmanned paper. Harry took the paper and found it to be the Daily Prophet. A confusing kind of joy set in. Finally there was something familiar; and yet it was the Daily Prophet.

He vanished back into his room, sat down on the bed, and opened the paper.

It was the year 1990. Jesus Christ had still been nailed to the cross—that, at least, had stayed the same.

Harry's breath caught as he saw the large image plastered across the front page. On a majestic balcony, overseeing a marching army of thousands, stood Severus Snape. Airplanes tore howling across the palace of which the balcony was a part.

Since it _was_ the Daily Prophet, the image soon zoomed in of its own volition. Snape's hooked nose got focused the most. He surveyed the troops with a morose, yet critical eye for detail.

What interested Harry far more was that the camera shot showed, beside Snape, the inside of the room that lay behind the balcony. And in that small stretch of photo, Harry saw a large runic stone cased in glass.


End file.
